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MORE    LIGHT. 


A   RATIONAL    TREATISE    ON 

BIBLICAL    SUBJECTS 


BY 


RABBI    L.    WEISS, 


COLUMBUS,    GA. 


The    block    Publishing    and    Printing    Company, 
cincinnati,  1892. 


i      ,>     J     *      w  -^ 


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Copyrighted  according  to  Lawt/\^ 


\1 


*         •>     •        *        ^  u 


PREFACE. 

"Seize  upon  truth  wherever  found, 
On  Christian  or  on  heathen  ground; 
Among  your  friends,  among  your  foes  ; — 
The  plant's  divine  where'er  it, grows." 

With  this  principle  imbedded  in  my  breast  do  I  enter 
the  task  of  shedding  more  light  on  subjects  that  so  often 
come  before  us  inquiringly. 

It  is  not  my  object  to  nullify  my  neighbor's  creed  and 
religion  and  establish  my  own,  but  to  pave  the  path  that 
leads  us  nearer  to  one  another. 

"More  Light!"  were  Goethe's  last  words,  and  just  as 
the  human  e3'e  delights  in  light  so  should  the  human  soul 
be  inspired  with  more  light. 

May,  then,  the  reader  that  had  gained  the  light  of  re- 
ligion, in  a  measure  that  illuminates  the  narrow  sphere  of 
dogmatic  sectarianism  only,  glean  more  light  from  this  little 
volume — light  that  illumines  the  entire  universe — and  rec- 
ognize the  Fatherhood  of  God  and  brotherhood  of  man. 

The  Author. 

442341 


•  >' '  ■  '•■. 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  TO  BE  SAVED  ? 

THIS  question  is  foreign  to  Jews  and  Judaism.  It  was 
never  propounded  to  or  by  Moses,  the  Prophets,  or 
any  Jewish  writer  of  Biblical  or  Talmudical  litera- 
ture. It  is  a  New  Testament  inquiry,  which  later  became 
misconstrued  and  is  by  many  misunderstood,  which  I  will 
demonstrate  in  my  next  chapter.  At  present  I  will  merely 
show  why  this  question  is  not  agitated  by  Jews  and  Jewish 
writers.     Ra])bis  that  have  lived  long  before  us  have  agreed 

that  S3-  D^iy^  p^n  D-^  v^  □'?ij;n  moisaD'  D^pn:;  "the 

righteous,  of  Avhatever  people,  have  a  share  in  the  world 
hereafter,"  without  laying  down  a  rule  for  non-Jeios  how  to 
be  righteous. 

Some  Christians  say,  to  be  righteous  one  must  believe  in 
Christ;  but  Jews  and  Judaism  do  not  deprive  any  one  of 
his  rights  to  think  and  to  exercise  his  virtue  according  to 
the  dictates  of  his  belief.  It  matters  not  what  the  ceremonies 
appertaining  to  his  worship  are  as  long  as  his  propensities 
otherwise  are  beneficial  to  the  world  and  mankind. 
ntt'yor;  «'?S  Ip'^y  w^mcn  ^h  "  Not  the  creed,  but  the  deed,  is 
the  cardinal  principle  "  in  Judaism  ;  and  it  is  proper  to  say 
here  that  if  virtue  and  morality  are  the  saving  propensities 
of  man,  we  can  draw  no  line  of  sej^aration   between    the 


>      k  < 


59,V3d ,  ones,  for  thes^e  attributes  are  innate  with  all  enlight- 
ened people  without  regard  of  creed. 

Let  it  further  be  understood  that  there  is  no  Jeivish  virtue 
or  morality,  nor  Christian  virtue  and  morality.  Virtue  is 
virtue,  and  morality  is  morality,  regardless  of  whose  breast 
they  abide  in.  "  What  makes  me  a  good  Jew  makes  you 
a  good  Christian,"  said  Lessing,  and  it  is  God's  truth. 

The  dime  of  the  charitable  Christian  will  not  buy  for  the 
poor,  hungry  person  a  larger  loaf  of  bread  than  will  the 
dime  of  the  charitable  Jew. 

The  chastity  that  makes  a  Christian  woman  pure  and 
virtuous  makes  not  less  so  the  Jewish  woman. 

Purity  is  purity,  and  morality  is  morality,  with  every- 
body, 

"  Shall  ignorance  of  good  and  ill 
Dare  to  direct  th'  eternal  will? 
Seek  virtue  ;   and  of  that  possess'd, 
To  Providence  resign  the  rest." 

Enlightenment,  then,  tells  us  that  God  gave  not  religion 
for  His  own  edification  —  for  we  can  not  add  to  His  glory, 
nor  can  we  magnify  His  greatness.  He  gave  religion  to 
edify  mankind,  to  perfect  man's  morals,  and  to  make  man 
virtuous  and  righteous.  If,  then,  my  neighbor's  religion 
has  the  efficacy  to  do  that  for  him,  and  mine  is  as  efficacious 
with  me,  the  just  and  truthful  God  will  assuredly  not  disre- 
gard the  good  qualities  of  man  because  his  ceremonies  are 
not  conformable  to  a  certain  church  ritual. 

Ceremonials  are  intended  to  evoke  solemnity  and  devotion, 
but  are  otherwise  of  no  vital  importance,  and  not  neces- 
sarily essential,  and  those  who  believe  that  it  is  necessary 
to  believe  in  Jesus  as  a  Christ,  in  Mohammed  as  a  Re- 


deemer,  or  in  Moses  as  a  Mediator  between  God  and  man, 
impeach  the  loving  kindness  and  justness  of  God.  Man 
would  not  reject  his  child,  and  especially  a  good  child, 
merely  because  of  the  opinion  it  entertains,  thinking  it  does 
so  to  please  its  father,  but  God  is  supposed  to  send  the  best 
man,  the  purest  woman  and  the  most  righteous  person  to 
perdition  for  the  mere  fault  of  not  believing  in  Christ  as  a 
Savior — a  faith  they  can  not  comprehend,  hence  can  not 
accept. 

Scriptures  tell  us  of  Absalom  (II.  Samuel  xix.),  the  son 
of  David,  how  perniciously   he   revolted  against   his   own 
father,  who  loved  him  with  fond  devotion,  and  when  he  met 
with  a  horrible  death  when  on  his  way  to  persecute  and 
oppress   his  father,  the  father  wept  bitterly  and  lamented 
over  his  son.     So  could  we  to-day  find  parents  that  would 
clasp  to  their  bosom  their  child,  even  though  it  were  the 
most  perverse  and  degraded  of  creatures,  especially  if  it 
would  come  suppliantly  before  them  ;  but  God,  who  can  see 
the  petitioner's  real  sincerity  and  contrition,  who  can  per- 
ceive that  the  soul  is  truly  repentant  —  as  all  secrets  and 
hidden  things  are  revealed  to  Him  — is  less  merciful  than 
man.     He   will   not   receive  the  sinner,  nor  the  righteous, 
except  they  come  to  Him  through  a  savior.    Is  this  rational? 
Judaism  says,  no  !     "  The  Lord  is  good  to  all,  and  His  mercy 
extends  to  all  His  creatures"  (Ps.  cxlv.9),  and  the  question, 
"  What  shall  we  do  to  be  saved?"  remains  forever  inapt  to 
embody  in  its  precepts. 

When  Moses  gave  the  laws  to  Israel  —  laws  that  became 
the  groundwork  of  all  laws  and  creeds — he  gave  them 
Dri2  ^rh  "  TO  LIVE  BY  THEM."  (See  Lev.  xviii.  18.)  In  his  last 
premonitions   and   admonitions  (Deutr.  xxx.  19}  he   lays 


before  Israel  life  and  death,  blessing  and  curse,  but  "  Choose 
thou  life!^'  said  he,  "  that  thou  shall  live  and  also  thy  children. ^^ 
Here  would  have  been  the  time  to  impress  them  with  a  soul- 
saving  doctrine  by  a  savior,  instead  of  which  this  greatest 
of  teachers  impresses  his  flock  before  he  dies  with  the  all- 
important  and  sublime  doctrine  that  teaches  life. 

Thus  Judaism  does  not  agitate  the  question,  "  How  shall 
we  be  saved  in  the  hereafter?"  but  it  particularly  teaches  us 
how  to  live  here.  Real  life  on  earth  will  secure  us,  uncon- 
sciously, life  everlasting,  and  if  one  should  ask  us  for  a 
substitute  for  the  question  before  us  we  would  ask  one  more 
important  and  more  sublime,  viz. ;  "  How  shall  we  live?  and 
how  shall  we  impart  life  to  our  children?  " 


WHAT  MUST  I  DO  TO  BE  SAVED  ? 

THAT  the  soul-saving  theory  as  conceived  and  construed 
by  Christians  is  not  concurred  in  by  Jews  and  Juda- 
ism, I  have  demonstrated  in  the  preceding  chapter ; 
and  now  I  intend  to  show  that  the  New  Testament  itself 
does  not  promulgate  the  idea,  but  later  commentators  must 
have  adopted  it. 

That  Jews  do  not  accept  the  authenticity  of  the  New 
Testament  is  hardly  necessary  to  mention  as  a  defense  why 
they  do  not  accept  doctrines  prescribed  therein,  but  were 
they  inclined  to  accept  this  particular  doctrine  that  so 
deeply  concerns  the  soul,  they  would  be  at  a  loss  to  find  it 


9 

promulgated  in  its  pages.  It  appears  but  once  in  the  entire 
book,  where  a  prison-keeper  asks  Paul  and  Silas,  "  Sirs, 
what  must  T  do  to  be  saved?"  (Acts  xvi.  30),  to  which  the 
answer,  of  course  is,  "  Believe  in  Jesus."  But  what  was 
meant  by  being  saved?  That  will  now  be  my  object  of 
demonstration.  With  Israelites  it  signified  nothing  else  but 
temporal  salvation,  and  so  it  was  spoken  of  by  Scriptural 
writers,  and  also  later  by  the  rabbins,  who,  when  they  agitated 
the  salvation  of  the  soul,  spoke  of  it  in  unequivocal  terms 
as  S'nn  Q^iyn  "•TI  "  the  life  of  the  hereafter,''  or  ^'eternal  life." 
To  be  saved,  therefore,  and  to  inherit  eternal  life  were  two 
different  expectations  as  implanted  in  the  breast  of  Israel. 
One  evoked  hope  of  temporal  or  material  existence,  the 
other  of  celestial  or  eternal  existence. 

We  read  in  Scriptures  (Judges  iii.  9)  that  "the  Lord 
raised  up  a  savior  to  Israel  " — in  the  person  of  Othniel,  who 
saved  them  from  calamity  and  disaster.  In  II.  Kings 
(xiii.  5)  we  read  that  "  the  Lord  gave  Israel  a  savior'' — in 
the  person  of  Jehoahaz. 

Nehemiah  (ix.  27)  says  :  "  Thou  (God)  gavest  them  (Is- 
rael) saviors  that  saved  them,"  etc. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  sift  the  entire  Scriptures.  This  is 
sufficient  to  substantiate  the  assertion  that  Israel  and  Scrip- 
ture writers  understood  in  the  term  to  be  saved  temporal 
salvation,  and  the  savior  was  a  human  being  that  led  them 
on  to  this  salvation;  while  the  salvation  theory  as  promul- 
gated l)y  Christians  is  contradictory  of  the  manifold  assur- 
ances enunciated  in  Scriptures,  that  God  alone,  and  none 
else,  is  the  savior  of  Israel  and  also  of  all  mankind. 

I  will  cite  a  few  of  the  many  assurances  : 

"  I  am  the  Lord  ;  beside  me  there  is  no  savior."     (Isaiah 
xliii.  11.) 


10 

"A  just  God  and  a  savior  there  is  none  beside  me."  (Ibid, 
xlv.  21.) 

"All  flesh  shall  know  that  I  am  th}^  savior,"  etc.  (Ibid, 
xlix.  26.) 

"Thou  shalt  know  that  I  am  thy  savior,"  etc.  (Ibid. 
Ix.  16.) 

"  There  is  no  savior  beside  me."     (Hosea  xiii.  4  ) 

The  most  striking  proof  that  God  is  the  savior  of  all 
mankind  indiscriminately,  and  extending  His  salvation  un- 
conditionally (and  without  vicarious  atonement)  is  found 
in  Isaiah  (xlv.  22,  23),  "  Look  (or  turn)  unto  me,  and  be  ye 
saved,  all  the  ends  of  the  earth,  for  I  am  God  and  none  else. 
I  have  sworn  by  myself,  the  word  is  gone  out  of  my  mouth 
in  righteousness,  and  shall  not  return."  Did  God  become  a 
perjurer?     We  believe  not. 

That  Israel  believed  to  find  in  virtue  and  morality  the 
redeeming  qualities  of  that  salvation  which  the  word  bears 
on  its  surface,'  and  as  demonstrated  here,  is  clearly  evident 
when  we  read  Jeremiah  iv.  14.     He  says  : 

"  Wash  thy  heart  that  thou  mayest  be  saved."  The  prophet 
does  not  urge  us  to  believe,  to  pray,  to  be  baptized,  or  to 
conform  to  any  prescribed  ceremony,  but  exhorts  us  to 
purify  the  heart  in  order  to  be  saved. 

Now,  we  ask,  who  wrote  the  New  Testament?  Jews,  of 
course,  with  Jewish  thoughts,  Jewish  sentiments  and  Jewish 
tenets  pervading  their  breasts,  and  their  writings  bear  no 
marks  of  any  difference  as  regards  the  precepts  and  princi- 
ples of  the  Jewish  writers  of  previous  ages,  and  when  they 
wrote  of  the  saving  of  the  soul  they  expressed  it,  like  other 
Jews,  with  eternal  life. 

When  Jesus  was  asked  (Matt.  xix.  16;  Mark  x.  17;  Luke 
xviii.  17),  "  What  shall  I  do  that  I  may  inherit  eternal  lifef^ 


11 

(not  to  be  saved)  he  did  not  reply,  "  Believe  in  me,"  but  he 
said,  "  Follow  the  Commandments."  To  inherit  eternal  life 
faith  was  not  a  sufficient  attribute ;  the  deed,  and  not  the 
creed,  secures,  according  to  extant  Jewish  doctrines,  eternal 
life,  and  Jesus  the  Jew  taught  it  not  difierent. 

At  another  time  (Luke  x.  25)  he  answered  the  same  ques- 
tion witli  "  Love  the  Lord  with  all  thy  heart,  and  with  all 
thy  soul,  and  with  all  thy  might  (vide  Deuter.  vi.  5),  and 
love  tliy  neighbor  as  thyself"  (vide  Lev.  xix.  LS).  This 
alone  would  suffice  to  prove  that  the  New  Testament  writers 
did  not  confound  the  theory  of  temporal  salvation  with  that 
of  eternal  life.  But  we  will  quote  one  more  instance  of 
striking  evidence  : 

When  Jesus  healed  a  sick  woman  (Luke  vii.  50),  and 
another  time  a  blind  man  (Ibid,  xviii.  42),  he  said  to  each, 
"  Thy  faith  hath  saved  thee."  Saved  from  what?  From 
sickness,  and  brought  to  health.  It  could  not  have  meant 
that  their  souls  were  saved,  as  they  w^ere  yet  alive ;  and 
however  pure  in  faith  they  may  have  been  at  that  time,  they 
could  yet  have  lost  all  faith  before  they  died ;  hence  it  is 
clearly  evident  that  Jesus  alluded  to  their  temporal  salva- 
tion—  they  were  saved  from  malady  and  brought  to  health. 

When  the  disciples  of  the  Nazarene  reformer  taught  to 
believe  in  Jesus  and  be  saved,  they  promulgated  a  doctrine 
for  publicans,  sinners  and  degraded  heathens  who  had  no 
divine  religion  to  prompt  them  to  lead  a  better  life  ;  but  the 
Jews  had  sublime  precepts  and  beautiful  doctrines,  and  to 
be  good  and  righteous  they  had  only  to  follow  them.  But 
those  of  the  new  creed  tried  to  save  —  that  is,  to  a  loftier 
existence  —  people  that  would  not  listen  to  Jewish  doctrines, 
hence  the  best  way  to  teach  them  was  to  believe  in  their 
leader  and  master,  to  follow  his  ways,  precepts  and  exam- 


1^ 

pie.  With  the  rise'  aind  progress  of  that  Christianity,  which 
introduced  measures  of  diametrical  difference  between  tlie 
religion  of  Israel  and  its  own,  which  is  incontrovertibly  of 
a  later  period  by  more  than  three  hundred  years  than  tlie 
life  and  existence  of  Jesus,  rose  and  progressed  the  idea 
that  modern  divines  and  commentators  entertain  regarding 
salvation  of  the  soul.  Their  idea,  however,  rests  on  blind 
fixith,  unsupported  by  reason,  and  misconstrued  from  Scrip- 
ture passages,  contradictory  of  their  own  golden  rule  to  "  do 
unto  others  as  they  would  be  done  by."  They  would  not 
like  to  be  damned,  but  they  damn  others  who  conform  not 
to  their  faith.  They  want  their  opinion  to  be  respected,  but 
the  opinion  of  others  who  do  not  believe  as  they  do  they 
consider  wrong ;  otherwise  they  would  have  no  damnatory 
doctrines. 

What  must  I  do  to  be  saved?  then,  should  be  answered 
thus  :  Endeavor  to  be  a  good  and  upright  man  or  woman, 
no  matter  what  your  creed  is.  Be  honest,  be  just  in  all 
your  ways  and  dealings,  and  never  do  to  others  that  which 
would  displease  you  if  others  did  it  to  you. 


13 


DID   THE  JEWS   REJECT  CHRIST  ? 

I^HE  imputation  of  Christians  is  that  the  Jews  rejected 
Christ,  but,  although  it  would  be  sufficiently  reason- 
able to  reply  that  the  Jews  never  expected  a  Messiah 
of  such  character  as  Christians  made  of  Jesus,  viz.,  a 
divine  being,  yet  I  will  not  enlarge  on  that  argument,  but 
look  into  the  pages  of  the  New  Testament  and  see  how  this 
imputation  is  substantiated. 

Of  all  the  New  Testament  writers  John  alone  says  (John 
i.  11) :  '•  He  came  unto  his  own,  but  his  own  received  him 
not."  Matthew,  Mark  and  Luke  merely  chronicle  the  words 
of  Jesus :  "  The  stone  v.'hich  the  builders  rejected  has 
become  the  chief  of  the  corner,"  which  is  a  verbatim  quota- 
tion from  Psalm  cxviii.  22,  but  they  say  nothing  as  to  who 
were  meant  by  the  builders ;  and  if  they  said  plainly,  as  did 
John,  that  it  meant  the  Jews,  we  would  still  investigate  the 
whole  writings,  even  as  we  do  now,  and  come  to  conclusions 
accordingly. 

We  read  (Matt.  xxii.  37;  Mark  xii.  30;  Luke  x.  27,  that 
Jesus  was  teaching,  "  Thou  shalt  love  the  Lord  thy  God 
with  all  thy  heart  and  with  all  thy  soul,"  etc.,  "  and  thou 
shalt  love  thy  neighbor  as  thyself." 

Was  there  in  this  anything  for  Jews  to  accept?  Have 
they  not  had  this  in  their  own  Scriptures  (vide  Deuter.  vi.  5, 
and  Levit.  xix.  8),  written  and  commended  by  Moses  nigh 
two  thousand  years  before? 

Jesus  taught :  "  What  you  would  that  man  should  do  to 
you,  so  shall  you  do  to  him."     Did  not  the  Jews  hear  the 


14 

iiieek  and  gentle  Hillel  giving  this  precept  to  a  heathen  who 
wanted  to  embrace  Judaism,  in  words  very  little  different, 
yet  meaning  the  same,  viz.,  "What  is  displeasing  to  thee  do 
it  not  to  others?" 

To  an  inquirer  who  wanted  to  know  Avhat  he  should  do  to 
inherit  eternal  life,  Jesus  said  :  "  If  thou  wilt  enter  eternal 
life,  keep  the  Commandments."  (Matt.  xix.  17.)  Surely 
there  was  nothing  new  in  this  for  Jews,  upon  whom  the 
Commandments  were  made  obligatory  on  Sinai  by  God's 
own  revelation. 

To  the  question,  which  was  the  first  Commandment,  Jesus 
replied  (Mark  xii.  28) :  "  Hear,  0  Israel !  the  Lord  our  God 
is  one!"  This  beautiful  confession  of  God's  indivisible 
unity  was  then,  as  it  is  to-day,  embodied  in  every  prayer  of 
the  Israelites  —  prayers  private  and  public,  composed  for 
both  reformers  and  orthodox.  So  in  this,  like  in  all  other 
teachings  of  Jesus  of  an  ethical  and  divine  character,  the 
Jews  could  not  discover  anything  that  they  had  not  pre- 
viously heard  and  accepted. 

It  is  now  meet  to  ask  the  question,  did  he  ever  offer  him- 
self to  the  Jews  for  acceptence? 

Let  us  see.  We  read  (Matt.  iv.  23)  that  he  went  about 
all  Galilee  teaching  and  preaching  in  the  Synagogues.  What 
he  preached  and  what  he  taught  is  not  specified,  nor  was  he 
rejected  anywhere,  hence  we  can  infer  from  this  that  he  must 
have  preached  and  taught  that  which  was  compatible  with 
Judaism.  He  was,  however,  a  reformer,  and  to  propagate 
his  ideas  he  gave  the  Jews  the  assurance  (vide  Matt,  v  17)  : 
"Think  not  tliat  I  came  to  destroy  the  law  and  the  prophets. 
I  came  not  to  destroy,  but  to  fulfill."  Like  the  aim  of  all 
Jewish  reformers,  to  do  away  with  rabbinism  and  priest- 
ocracy  and  strengthen  the  tenets  prescribed  in  Scriptures, 


15 

such  must  have  been  the  aim  of  Jesus,  and  he  manifested 
it  in  all  his  manners  and  utterances. 

When  the  Pharisees  on  one  occasion  saw  him  feasting 
with  a  common  class  of  people  and  they  asked  his  disciples, 
"  Why  eateth  your  master  with  publicans  and  sinners?"  he 
replied,  "  The  whole  need  no  physician,  but  the  sick.  I 
came  not  to  call  the  righteous,  but  sinners,  to  repentance." 
(Matt.  ix.  11-13.)  Does  this  not  plainly  indicate  that  he 
considered  the  Pharisees  righteous,  not  needing  his  minis- 
tration, and  consequently  went  to  call  publicans  and  sinners 
to  a  better  and  purer  life?  If  he  afterward  did  speak  harshly 
to  some  scribes  and  Pharisees,  that  does  not  signify  that  all 
scribes  and  Pharisees,  and  all  Jews  especially,  were  included 
in  his  condemnatories.  The  ones  he  spoke  to  first  must 
have  been  different  from  those  he  spoke  to  afterward ;  all 
were  not  wicked,  nor  did  he  say  that  they  were. 

We  find  him  (Ibid.  Ix.  6)  charging  his  disciples  to  go  to 
the  lost  sheep  of  Israel,  not  to  Israel  the  lost  sheep,  not  to 
the  whole  nation,  but  to  those  that  were  lost  to  the  nation. 
He  himself,  however,  did  not  go  ;  he  only  sent  his  disciples  ; 
but  they  did  not  go  that  time,  nor  is  it  stated  why. 

How  tolerant  the  Jews  were  appears  from  the  story  chron- 
icled in  John  viii.  7,  where  they  brought  before  him  an 
adulterous  woman,  asking  him  to  pass  judgment  upon  her' 
and  he  passed  this  sentence :  "  He  who  is  without  sin 
among  you  let  him  first  cast  a  stone  at  her."  And  imme- 
diately, one  by  one,  they  left  the  room,  leaving  him  alone 
with  the  woman. 

This  demonstrates  with  what  tolerance  Jesus  was  treated, 
when  they  submitted  a  case  for  trial  to  him  which  belonged 
to  local  and  regularly  installed  judges ;  and,  furthermore, 
when   sentence   was   passed  —  perhaps  beyond  what  they 


16 

expected  —  they  silently  withdrew,  leaving  the  case  without 
any  further  prosecution.  Does  this  show  any  signs  of  rejec- 
tion of  Jesus? 

Furthermore,  it  is  meet  to  ask,  why  was  the  New  Testa- 
ment written  in  Greek  and  not  in  Hebrew  if  it  was  at  all 
intended  for  a  Hebrew  people? 

That  Greek  was  then  the  language  of  the  country,  we  are 
well  aware,  but  the  Jews  could  best  speak  the  Hebrew  lan- 
guage, and  that  was  the  language  they  all  spoke ;  while  the 
Greek  language  may  have  been  spoken  well  by  some,  it  was 
not  spoken  well  by  others,  and  very  imperfectly  by  the 
masses ;  and  besides  their  Scriptures  were  in  Hebrew,  their 
divine  services  were  conducted  in  Hebrew,  even  more  so 
than  they  are  to-day,  and  Jesus  himself  spoke  Hebrew  in 
preference  to  the  Greek,  which  is  evident  from  the  last 
words  he  spoke  on  the  cross :  "  Eli,eli,  lamah  Shahahtainf 
(Matt.  xvii.  46.) 

This  suffices  to  show  that  there  was  nothing  in  the  teach- 
ings of  Jesus  to  indicate  that  he  offered  to  the  Jews  a  new 
creed,  nor  that  he  anywhere  offered  himself  to  them  as 
their  messiah.  His  aims,  from  all  appearances,  were  to 
impart  some  of  the  moral  ethics  of  the  Jews  to  the  Gentiles, 
who  had  no  divine  religion,  and  who  would  not  go  the  Jews 
to  receive  it.  Jesus  lived  and  died  as  a  Jew.  He  took  pains 
during  his  lifetime  to  observe  the  feasts  of  the  Jews,  he 
advocated  their  moral  laws,  and  words  from  their  Scriptures 
closed  his  lips  in  death.  In  short,  a  Christ  was  neither 
offered  to  nor  rejected  by  the  Jews  ;  nor  was  the  book  that 
teaches  Christianity  intended  for  Jews. 


17 


DID  THE  JEWS  CRUCIFY  CHRIST? 

r'p>HIS  would  hardly  need  a  reply  from  the  Jews,  for  even 
I  if  it  were  indisputably  evident  that  the  Jews  at  that 
remote  time  did  crucify  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  their  pos- 
terity could  not  reasonably  be  held  accountable  for  wrongs 
committed  over  eighteen  hundred  years  ago.  Yet  for  the 
sake  of  truth  we  will  examine  into  this  matter.  Before 
investigating,  however,  whether  Jews  did  crucify  Jews,  we 
will  ask,  are  we  still  held  accountable  for  the  deed  ? 

Matthew  chronicles  (xxvii.  25),  which  is  corroborated  by 
none  of  the  other  Gospel  writers  :  "His  (Jesus')  blood  be 
on  us  and  our  children."  But  God,  who,  according  to 
Scripture,  would  visit*  the  iniquities  of  the  fathers  upon 
their  children  unto  the  third  and  fourth  generation  (vide 
Exod.  XX.  5;  Deuter.  v.  9),  would  not  accept  such  pledge. 
He  would  not  listen  to  such  a  heartless  avowal  and  permit 
it  to  stand  forever. 

Man  would  not  be  so  merciless  as  to  mete  out  punishment 
to  innocent  people  merely  because  their  parents  vowed  so, 
much  less  an  omniscient  Father.  However  reasonable  this 
sounds,  yet  some  will  say  that  the  ways  of  the  Lord  are 
unsearchable,  and  man's  argument,  however  forcible  it  may 
be,  will  not  be  regarded  worthy  of  consideration  unless  it  is 
supported  by  Biblical  statements ;  and  to  answer  it  thus  it 
it  is  meet  that  we  begin  with  the  descendants  and  progeny 
of  the  Jews. 

*Explanatory  of  this  see  on  another  page  the  subject,  "Will  God 
punish  children  for  the  sins  of  parents?" 


18 

According  to  Scriptures,  the  lineage  of  the  Jews  is  traced 
back  to  Shem,  who  manifested  toward  his  father  filial  love 
and  respect,  of  which  his  brothers  Ham  and  Japhet  were 
void  (vide  Gen.  ix.  23) ;  hence  writers  determined  that  he 
was  more  refined  and  had  naturally  better  blood  in  his  veins, 
which  was  transmitted  into  the  veins  of  his  descendants. 
Thus  we  find  that  his  descendants,  Abraham,  Isaac  and 
Jacob,  are  chosen  by  God,  in  preference  to  other  people 
around  them,  to  become  the  standard-bearers  of  God's 
truth,  and  this  distinction  was  ingrafted  into  their  posterity, 
Israel ;  the  blood  of  Shem  ran  in  the  veins  of  these  patri- 
archs, and  their  blood  ran  and  still  runs  in  the  veins  of 
their  descendants. 

Notwithstanding  that  the  Jews  descended  from  an  idol- 
atrous people  —  all  were  idolaters  at  one  time  —  there  is  no 
people  and  there  never  was  a  people  who  could  claim  a 
purer  progeny,  which  is  evident  from  the  fact  that  into  their 
hands  was  intrusted  the  transcendent  glory  of  light  divine. 

Long,  long  before  other  people  had  conceived  the  remotest 
idea  of  a  God  the  Jews  worshiped  the  true  God ;  and  the 
law  which  they  received  on  Sinai,  prohibiting  debasing  and 
fallacious  idolatries,  making  filial  respect  obligatory,  and 
forbidding  murder,  adultery  and  theft  —  crimes  that  have 
cursed  and  blasted  the  social  and  moral  life  of  all  other 
nations  —  could  only  improve  their  virtues  and  attributes. 
And  it  is  a  fact  beyond  dispute  that  theirs  was  the  only  code 
of  all  ancient  laws  that  contained  the  element  of  perpetuity. 

Whenever  they  violated  or  disregarded  these  laws  it  was 
always  due  to  a  lack  of  good  government,  for  no  sooner  had 
a  leader  risen  among  them  than  they  awoke  to  consciousness 
of  their  error  and  amended  their  ways. 


19 

Time  and  ages  have  made  many  a  change  in  the  Jews,  but 
they  have  by  no  means  degenerated  or  retrograded ;  on  the 
contrary,  they  have  improved,  progressed  and  advanced, 
and  at  the  time  when  the  Nazarene  reformer  existed  in 
Jerusalem,  they  were,  if  not  better,  assuredly  not  worse, 
than  formerly. 

There  may  have  been  —  na}',  there  were  —  some  wicked 
ones  among  them,  who  caused  and  created  disunion  and 
discord  among  the  people ;  but  all  of  a  nation  are  never 
corrupt ;  all  of  a  race,  creed  or  sect  are  not  nefarious  sin- 
ners ;  hence  when  the  New  Testament  writers  chronicle  that 
the  cry  was  made,  "  Crucify  him  !  crucify  him  !  "  we  must 
protest  and  sa}'  that  these  writers  must  either  have  made 
false  statements  or  made  a  mistake  themselves  —  mistaking 
the  Romans  for  Jews. 

In  vain  it  may  be  claimed  that  the  Bible  was  written  by 
inspiration,  and  that  its  pages  are  free  from  mistakes,  for 
both  the  Old  and  New  Testaments  contain  mistakes,  and 
merely  to  justify  my  assertion  I  will  quote  from  Matthew 
xxvii.  9,  whore  it  says  :  "  Then  was  fulfilled  that  which  was 
spoken  by  Jeremiah,  the  prophet,  saying,  '  And  they  took 
the  thirty  pieces  of  silver,'  "  etc.  This  is  not  found  in  Jere- 
miah. Is  this,  then,  not  a  mistake?  Again  it  says  (ibid. 
35)  :  "And  they  crucified  him  and  parted  his  garments,  cast- 
ing lots,  that  it  might  be  fulfilled  \vbi(-li  w;is  spoken  by  the 
prophet :  They  parted  my  garments  among  them,  and  upon 
my  vestures  did  they  cast  lots."  By  which  i)rophet  was 
tliis  spoken?  By  none.  Is  this  not  a  mistake?  And  if 
these  are  mistakes  they  are  enough  to  indicate  that  there  may 
be  still  more  mistakes,  among  which  is  this  particular  one 
we  write  of. 


20 

If  the  New  Testament  had  stated  that  Jesus  suffered 
death  by  the  impeachment  of  the  Jews,  notwithstanding 
that  the  Jews  had  at  that  time  neither  power  nor  influence 
with  the  Government,  we  coukl  still  infer  that  he  died,  if 
not  by  the  hands,  yet  through  the  instrumentality  of  the 
Jews ;  but  the  statement  alone  that  he  was  crucified  is  evi- 
dence that  the  Jews  had  nothing  to  do  with  it ;  for  according 
to  Jewish  law  punishment  of  death  was  meted  out  by  stoning, 
burning, beheading  or  strangulation  (hanging.)  Crucifying 
even  a  guilty  man  would  have  been  as  sinful  as  to  kill  an 
innocent  man,  and  the  whole  Jewry  would  not  have  toler- 
ated this,  if  it  was  in  their  power,  and  if  it  was  not  in  their 
power,  they  certainly  could  not  have  effected  the  crucifixion. 
If  the  Jews  had  had  so  much  influence  as  to  put  Jesus  to 
death,  they  could  have  also  obtained  privilege  to  do  it 
according  to  their  own  law ;  the  crucifixion,  however,  shows 
that  they  were  void  of  all  and  any  power  and  influence. 

Another  evidence  that  the  story  of  the  crucifixion  is 
incorrect  we  find  in  the  statement  that  he  was  crucified  on 
the  sixth  da}'^  of  the  week,  Friday ;  for  not  only  would  the 
Jews  not  have  executed  a  man  on  Passover,  nor  have  been 
present  at  the  crucifixion,  but  the  first  day  of  Passover, 
according  to  our  almanac  system,  never  falls  on  a  Friday,* 
and  that  this  was  the  first  day  of  that  feast  is  amply  shown 
by  the  fact  that  Jesus  himself  celebrated  the  Passover  the 
night  previous,  according  to  the  custom  of  Jews,  who  cele- 
brate all  their  feasts  and  Sabbaths  from  eve  to  eve. 

*If  tlie  first  day  of  Passover  falls  on  Friday,  IfaxlKuiah  Rahah, 
the  seventh  day  of  liooths,  would  fall  on  a  Saturday,  and  according 
to  rabbinical  law  the  Jews  gather  on  that  day  branches  of  brook- 
willows  for  their  ceremony,  which  could  not  be  done  on  a  Sabbath, 
hence  it  never  comes  on  a  Sabbath;  consequently  the  first  day  of 
Passover  never  occurs  on  Friday. 


21 

Then  the  scene  of  the  crucifixion  tells  us  that  there  waS 
not  a  Jew  — at  least  an  intelligent  Jew  —  present;  for  when 
Jesus  cried,  "  Eli,  eli,  lamah  Shabaktani?"  some  of  those 
present  thought  he  was  calling  Elijah  to  help  him.  If 
there  had  been  a  Jew  present  he  would  have  understood 
what  he  said,  for  it  was  in  pure  Hebrew,  and  that  was  the 
popular  language,  even  as  it  is  at  the  present  day  among  the 
Jews  in  Jerusalem,  and  he  would  have  corrected  the  misap- 
prehension. 

It  is  thus  evident  that  the  Jews  neither  crucified  Christ 
nor  had  anything  at  all  to  do  with  it. 

Now  it  is  meet  to  ask,  is  the  Jew  of  this  day,  or  was  he  in 
history  past,  sanguinary?  In  other  words,  are  the  Jews  in 
general  murderers?  Is  there  a  tendency  or  inclination  in 
them  to  be  murderers?  The  most  partial  observer  must  say 
no :  their  inclination  and  tendency  seem  to  be  in  the 
opposite  direction.  There  are  no  murderers  among  them. 
Why  not?  Is  it  because  the  law  of  the  land  forbids  it?  The 
same  law  ought  to  hold  others  in  due  bounds,  but  it  does 
not.  Why  not?  Because  the  Shemitic  blood  does  not  run 
in  their  veins  as  it  does  in  the  veins  of  the  Jews.  Carefully 
they  have  kept  that  blood  pure  by  non-intermarriage  with 
others  of  doubtful  progeny,  and  the  Shemitic  blood  makes 
them  naturally  refined,  temperate  and  law-abiding. 

Did  not  this  blood  run  in  their  veins  just  as  warm  at  the 
time  of  the  crucifixion  as  it  does  to-day?  Aye,  the  same 
blood  ran  through  their  veins,  and  the  God-given  law  that 
pervades  their  soul  to-day,  preserving  them  from  debasing 
criminality,  guided  their  moral  and  humane  propensities 
then.  The  God-given  law,  wherein  their  chief  seal  of  life 
and  strength  reposes  now,  ever  reposed ;  and  the  Jew  does 
not,  nor  did   he  ever,  deliglit  in    shedding   human   blood. 


22 

Why  should  he  have  clamored  then  for  the  blood  of  Jesus? 
He  did  not. 

The  Jews  did  not  crucify  Christ,  neither  with  their  own 
hands  nor  were  tliey  instrumental  in  his  crucifixion. 


THE  MESSIAH. 

FIRST,  the  question,  what  does  Messiah  mean?  naturally 
presents  itself.     Messiah,  in   Hebrew,   rT'w'Q,   means 
anointed,   and  is   applied  in   Scriptures   to   priests, 
kings,  and  sometimes  to  prophets.      Aaron   and  his   sons 
are    mentioned    as    having   received    the   sacerdotal   unc- 
tion ;    Saul,   David,    Solomon   and   other  kings   the   royal 
unction;  and  Elisha  the  prophetic  unction.     Others  may 
have  been  anointed  of  whom  Scriptures  take  no  notice,  but 
all  that  were  anointed  were  chosen  to  represent  what  they 
did,  either  by  God   or   the  peopl-e,  and  the   unction  was 
expressive  of  divine  favor  of  the  choice,  in  consequence  of 
which  they  were  called  the  messiahs  (anointed)  of  God.    In 
such  terms  Samuel  speaks  of  Saul  (I.  Sam.  xii.  35),  and 
that  appellation  is  also  applied  to  David  (II.  Sam.  xxiii.  1 ; 
Ps.  xviii.  51).     Even  Cyrus,  the  King  of  Persia,  the  friend 
and  benefactor  of  the  Jews,  is  called  God's  anointed  (Isaiah 
xliv.  1 )  ;  while  messiah  in  any  other  term  is  not  mentioned 
by  any  other  writer  in  the  Scriptures  except  Daniel,  and  he 
speaks  so  obscurely  that  it  has  puzzled  commentators  for 
over  two  thousand  years,  and  to  this  day  none  has  given 
a  definite  explanation  of  it. 


23 

All  tlie  prophecies  claiming  to  foretell  the  coming  of  a 
messiah  are  based  only  upon  constructions,  and  often  upon 
the  merest  inference.  True,  the  messianic  ideas  originated 
with  some  rahbis  of  yore,  who,  when  Israel  in  exile  suffered 
tyranny  and  oppression,  offered  them  as  a  sweet  consola- 
tion. "  Trust  in  God,  0  Israel !  "  were  their  exhortation. 
"  God  will  send  you  a  messiah,  a  deliverer  !  "  But  he  was 
never  mentioned  to  be  else  than  a  mortal  leader  —  a  pro- 
claimer  and  establisher  of  that  universal  peace  of  which 
the  prophets  speak  in  such  glowing  terms. 

Daniel  is  the  only  one  who  foretells  a  messiah,  and  how? 
In  a  vision,  while  immersed  in  deep  prayer,  he  sees  Gabriel 
and  hears  him  say  (Dan.  ix.  24),  "  I  am  come  to  show  thee 
—  for  thou  art  a  favorite  —  and  understand  the  thing  and 
consider  the  vision :  Seventy  weeks  are  determined  upon 
thy  people  and  upon  thy  holy  city  to  finish  the  transgres- 
sions and  to  make  an  end  of  sin,  and  to  pardon  inquity  and 
to  bring  righteousness  forever,  and  to  seal  up  the  vision  and 
prophecy,  and  to  anoint  the  most  holy.  Know  therefore 
and  understand — from  the  going  forth  of. the  decree  to 
return  (from  Babylon)  and  to  build  Jerusalem  unto  the 
princely  messiah  are  seven  weeks  and  sixty  and  two  weeks  ; 
the  streets  shall  be  built  again,  and  the  wall,  even  in  troub- 
lous times,  and  after  the  sixty  and  two  weeks  the  messiah 
shall  be  cut  off,  though  not  for  himself;  and  the  people  of 
the  coming  prince  shall  destroy  the  city  and  the  holiness, 
and  the  end  thereof  shall  be  with  a  flood,  and  unto  the  end 
of  the  war  desolations  are  determined.  And  he  shall  con- 
firm the  covenant  with  many  for  one  week,  and  in  the  midst 
of  the  week  he  shall  cause  the  sacrifice  and  oblation  to 
cease,"  etc. 


24 

I  will  not  even  attempt  a  detailed  commentary  on  this,  as 
its  inaptness  to  be  a  prophecy  foretelling  the  Christ  of  the 
Christians,  or  any  messiah  of  such  type,  is  too  apparent  if 
viewed  uninfluenced  by  blind  faith.  Not  a  particle  of  this 
has  transpired.  The  decree  went  forth  from  Cyrus  to  re- 
build Jerusalem  about  three  hundred  and  fifty  years  before 
the  Nazarene  reformer  lived,  and  if  the  seventy  weeks  had 
to  be  computed  into  any  other  time  but  weeks,  why  did 
Gabriel  not  say  so,  instead  of  leaving  it  to  the  speculative 
minds  of  the  various  commentators?  However,  since  he 
failed  to  do  so,  and  the  seventy  weeks  could  not  and  did  not 
again  build  up  and  destroy  Jerusalem,  it  remains  as  a 
meaningless  dream.  Transgression,  too,  was  not  punished, 
sin  not  ended,  and  righteousness  not  come  forever,  none 
was  anointed,  and  whatever  messiah  it  alludes  to  it  has 
failed  to  verify  in  this  prophecy. 

There  was  to  have  been  a  flood  and  a  devastating  war, 
during  which  the  city  and  holiness  were  to  have  been 
destroyed,  and  this  prince,  this  messiah,  whose  name  Daniel 
did  not  ask,  was  to  have  caused  the  sacrifice  and  oblation  to 
cease,  none  of  which  transpired  during  the  life  of  Jesus. 
There  was  no  war,  no  flood,  he  was  not  anointed,  and  sacri- 
fice and  oblation  ceased  nearly  half  a  century  after  his 
death. 

Here  the  question  would  arise,  did  the  rabbis  delude  the 
people  by  offering  them  a  theory  to  which  there  was  no 
foundation?  No,  they  did  not.  They  only  gave  this  great 
messenger  of  universal  peace  the  name  of  messiah,  because 
he  was  to  be  one  sent  by  God  and  accepted  by  the  people, 
but  the  foundation  of  this  lies  in  Scriptures.  This  rabbinic- 
messianic  era  was  to  be  the  culmination  of  time.  Scripture 
defines  it  as  the  last  of  days  (Micah  iv.  1),  when  "it  shall 


25 

come  to  pass  that  the  mountain  of  the  house  of  the  Lord 
shall  be  established  on  the  top  of  the  mountains,"  etc. 
*  *  *  "And  many  nations  shall  say,  come  and  let  us  go 
up  to  the  mountain  of  the  Lord,  and  to  the  house  of  the 
God  of  Jacob ;  and  he  will  teach  us  of  his  ways,  and  we 
will  walk  in  his  paths,"  etc.  *  *  *  "Nation  shall  not 
lift  up  sword  against  nation,  neither  shall  they  learn  war 
any  more."  *  *  *  "  For  the  mouth  of  the  Lord  hath 
spoken  it.  For  all  the  people  will  walk  each  in  the  name  of 
his  God,  and  we  will  walk  in  the  name  of  the  Lord  our  God 
forevermore." 

"  Mountain  "  standing  for  eminence,  it  is  evident  that  the 
religion  of  Israel  — "  the  mountain  of  the  house  of  the 
Lord  " —  shall  stand  on  that  eminence  due  to  it  —  due  to  a 
mother  religion.  This  does  not  say  that  any  other  creed  or 
religion  must  be  abolished,  but  many  nations  (as  is  the  case 
now  with  enlightened  people)  shall  come  and  say,  "Let  us 
go  to  the  house  of  the  God  of  Jacob,  and  he  will  teach  us 
his  ways,  and  we  will  walk  in  his  paths,"  i.  e.,  they  will 
maintain  their  own  religion,  but  they  will  begin  to  adopt 
the  principles  of  Israel,  which  are  hospitality,  charitable- 
ness, belief  in  a  common  fatherhood  of  God  and  brotherhood 
of  man,  the  result  of  which  is  universal  peace;  and  after  all 
shall  have  learned  to  walk  in  the  paths  of  the  house  of 
Jacob,  "  nation  will  not  lift  up  sword  against  nation  any 
more." 

Let  us  look  at  the  condition  of  Europe.  In  any  other 
age,  under  similar  conditions,  the  swords  would  have 
already  clashed,  the  muskets  cracked,  and  the  cannons 
roared,  but  year  by  year  arbitration  is  gaining  in  influence 
and  war  averted.     There  may  be  terrible  wars  yet,  but  the 


26 

time  will  surely  come  when  its  annihilatory  effect  will  banish 
war. 

It  is  furthermore  evident  from  the  concluding  passage 
that  "  all  the  people  will  walk  in  the  name  of  their  god,  and 
we  will  walk  in  the  name  of  the  Lord  our  God  forever- 
more." 

In  other  words,  whatever  one  believes,  let  him  believe  it. 
I  will  not  disturb  him,  much  less  hate  him  or  avoid  him  for 
it.  Let  him  follow  the  dictates  of  his  heart  and  conscience, 
and  I  will  follow  the  dictates  of  my  heart  and  conscience ; 
and  both  doing  so,  my  neighbor  will  quote :  "  Peace  on 
earth,  good  will  to  man."  And  I  will  quote :  "  Peace  to 
those  who  are  far  and  to  those  who  are  nigh."  And  sweet 
peace  will  reign  supreme.  No  more  shall  man  hate  and 
oppress  man  for  the  love  of  God.  That  will  be  Israel's 
messianic  age. 

"  When  from  pole  to  pole  and  from  sea  to  sea 
Men  unto  man  as  brother  will  be ; 
When  tyrants  will  cease,  and  sin  no  more  rage : 
This  will  be  Israel's  Messianic  age. 

"  When  from  pole  to  pole  and  from»sea  to  sea 
One  truth  will  reign,  and  all  creeds  will  agree  ; 
When  God  will  be  loved  by  child  and  by  sage  : 
This  will  be  Israel's  Messianic  age." 


m 


JESUS  OF  NAZARETH. 

WE  are  often  reminded  of  a  prophecy  in  Scriptures 
where  it  foretells  that  Jesus  was  to  be  born  in  Beth- 
lehem, and  yet  he  is  never  called  Jesus  of  Beth-le- 
hem,  but  Jesus  of  Nazareth.  From  this  it  becomes  appar- 
ent that  the  prophecy  foretelling  his  birth  in  Beth-le-hem 
must  have  been  adopted  by  modern  and  not  primitive 
Christian  commentators. 

Suppose  a  woman  from  Chicago  would  visit  St.  Louis, 
and  while  there  give  ])irth  to  a  child,  then  leave  St.  Louis 
as  soon  as  her  condition  would  permit,  would  that  make 
the  child  a  St.  Louisan?  Of  course  not.  The  same  is 
ai)pli(!able  to  Mary,  the  mother  of  Jesus.  She  lived  in 
Nazareth,  in  the  province  of  Galilee,  whence  she  visited 
Beth-lehem,  where,  immediately  upon  her  arrival,  she  gave 
birth  to  a  boy ;  and  as  soon  as  her  condition  allowed  she 
went  up  to  Jerusalem  to  offer  up  a  sacrifice  to  God,  accord- 
ing as  the  Jewish  law  then  required,  whence  she  returned 
home  to  Galilee  (vide  Luke  ii.  4) ;  and  her  son  was  called 
Jesus  of  Nazareth,  not  Jesus  of  Beth-lehem. 

The  prophecy  foretelling  his  birth  in  Beth-lehem  is 
claimed  to  be  contained  in  the  following  passage :  "  But 
thou  Beth-lehem  Ephrata,  though  thou  be  little  among  the 
thousands  of  Judah,  yet  out  of  thee  shall  come  forth  unto 
me  that  is  to  be  ruler  in  Israel,  whose  going  forth  (have 
been)  from  old,  from  everlasting."     (Micah  v.  2.) 

We  will  not  stop  here,  like  our  Christian  interrogator,  but 
continue  the  chapter.     Before  doing  so,  however,  we  will 


take  tiie  correct  trahslation  of  the;  original  Hebrew.  The 
words  "  have  been,^^  which  I  have  put  in  parenthesis,  are  not 
in  the  Hebrew  version,  but  were  supplied  by  Christian  trans- 
lators, for  what  purpose  it  is  not  ours  to  surmise.  Then  again 
they  mistranslate  the  words  DTp  ''0''D  (mimai  Kedem)  and 
ubl])  ''^''13  (mimai  olom)  as  from  old  and  from  everlasting. 
Mimai  Kedem  is  not  from  old,  and  mimai  olom  is  not  from 
everlasting,  but  from  formerly  and  from  ancient  days  (or  this 
could  be  from  old)  would  be  the  correct  translation,  ij;  "'IJJIS 
(me-adai  ad)  or  D'^d'^Ij;  ''D^iyD  (me-olmai  olonim)  would 
stand  for  from  everlasting. 

With  these  errors  corrected,  we  can  understand  the  sub- 
ject before  us  more  clearly,  although  we  can  not  see  how  our 
interrogator  can  come  to  the  conclusion  as  he  does  even 
with  his  translation,  when  he  reads  furtlier  in  the  chapter  : 
"And  this  man  shall  be  the  peace  when  the  Assyrians  shall 
come  into  our  land,^^  etc. 

This  person  coming  out  of  Beth-lehem,  then,  shall  have 
been  a  man,  no  savior  (of  men's  souls),  no  divine  being, 
and  he  shall  have  lived  at  the  time  when  the  Assyrians 
shall  have  come  into  the  land  of  Israel,  both  of  which  are 
inapt  to  ascribe  to  Jesus. 

He  is  claimed  to  be  a  divine  being,  and  surely  the  prophet 
should  have  spoken  more  understandingly  and  with  more 
reverence  than  to  simply  call  him  man,  and  the  Assyrian 
province  was  merged  into  Babylonia  long  before  he  was 
born ;  hence  no  Assyrians  came  during  his  lifetime,  and  thus 
he  was  not  the  peace  above  described.  Micah  spoke  here 
clearly  enough  of  contemporaneous  times  and  events,  and 
it  is  not  necessary  to  seek  in  it  mystic  interpretations.  He 
lived  ostensibly  during  the  reigns  of  Jotham,  Ahaz  and 
Hezekiah  (see  Jer.  xxvi.  18  and  Micah  i.  1),  and  he  knew 


29 

how  often  Israel  was  harassed  by  the  Assyrians  during  the 
reckless  rules  of  some  kings.  When  we  read  then  in  II. 
Kings  xviii.  and  II.  Chron.  xix.  that  Hezekiah  introduced  a 
good  reign  and  withstood  the  attacks  of  the  Assyrians, 
uniting  eventually  the  divided  Israelites  with  a  grand  cele- 
bration of  the  feast  of  freedom,  or  Passover  (see  II.  Chron. 
XXX.),  we  conclude  that  the  prophet  spoke  of  Hezekiah, 
who  was  the  son  of  the  wicked  Ahaz.  The  prophet  saw  his 
qualities  and  qualifications,  his  tendencies  and  his  inclina- 
tions, and  he  understood,  and  gave  utterance  thereto,  that 
Hezekiah  would  be  the  ma7i  of  peace — the  man  that  would 
subdue  Assyria.  Just  as  we  of  to-day  often  form  opinions 
of  the  future  of  some  government  after  the  death  of  its 
king,  based  on  our  ideas  of  the  crown  prince,  thus  Hezekiah, 
being  the  crown  prince,  the  prophet  passed  on  him  an 
encomium,  considering  him  a  good  regent,  which  he  was  as 
long  as  he  ruled. 

The  prophet  does  not  say  that  this  man  was  to  be  born 
in  Beth-lehem ;  he  only  speaks  of  his  descent  as  a  Beth- 
lehemite  ;  and  it  is  a  well-known  idiom  in  Scripture  language 
that  David  is  taken  as  a  criterion  throughout  all  its  writ- 
ings. David,  the  boy  of  Beth-lehem,  was  called  the  father 
of  all  the  kings  of  Israel,  as  also  here  (see  II.  Chron.  xxix. 
2) :  "And  he  (Hezekiah)  did  justly  in  the  eyes  of  the 
Lord,  according  to  all,  as  his  father  David  had  done." 

Let  us  now  return  once  more  to  our  first  passage  and  test 
its  prophetic  contents  a  little  closer :  ''  But  thou,  Beth- 
lehem Ephrata,  though  thou  be  little  among  the  thousands 
of  Judah,  yet  out  of  thee  shall  come  forth  unto  me  that  is 
to  be  ruler  in  Israel,"  etc.  It  bears  on  its  face  the  mark 
of  inaptitude,  in  so  far  that  Jesus  is  not  ruler  now  and 
never  was  ruler  in  Israel.     If  he  rules  at  all,  he  rules  in 


30 

Christendom,  with  Israel  to  protest  his  divine  sovereignty 
and  dominion.  Thus  take  the  passage  as  you  will,  with 
either  of  the  two  translations,  that  Beth-lehem  birth  estab- 
lishes nothing  to  prove  the  Christians'  claim,  and  leaves  the 
Jews  still  of  the  opinion  that  Jesus  was  neither  ruler,  savior 
nor  god,  but  simply  Jesus  of  Nazareth. 


WILL  GOD  PUNISH  THE  CHILDREN  FOR  THE 
SINS  OF  PARENTS? 

JUDAISM  is  not  a  religion  of  chance  or  speculation,  but 
a  religion  based  on  fundamentals  that  can  firmly 
bear  and  support  the  superstructures  erected  on  it. 
Israel's  history  bears  testimony  to  this.  Judaism,  further- 
more, fears  not  the  glaring  light  of  the  most  rigid  exam- 
ination, and  dares  to  stand  before  the  searching  gaze  of  the 
most  critical  investigators  ;  and  the  more  it  is  investigated 
the  better  it  is  understood,  hence  the  better  it  is  understood 
the  better  it  is  appreciated.  The  older  it  grows  the  purer  it 
gets.  These  remarks  I  have  deemed  necessary  because 
some  religionists  would  find  scruples  to  differ  with  the 
(so-called)  authorized  version  of  the  Bible,  and  would  fear 
to  swerve  from  the  adopted  ideas  of  the  anteceding  Church 
fathers,  priests  and  rabbis.  Formerly  there  were  some  who 
were  by  some  fanatics  led  to  believe  that  on  account  of  the 
iniquities  of  a  single  sinner  a  whole  congregation  or  com- 
munity would  be  visited  by  the  wrath  of  God,  but  this  can 
by  no  means  be  substantiated  by  Scriptural  information. 

Moses  (Deutr.  xxiv.  16;  Isaiah  xxi.  29;  Ezekiel  xviii,  2) 
and  others  clearly  expressed  that  fathers  shall  not  suffer  for 


31 

the  sins  of  their  children,  nor  shall  children  suffer  for  the 
sins  of  their  fathers.  Would  a  ''merciful  and  long-suffering 
God  "  punish  one  for  the  sins  and  wrongs  of  another?  And 
yet  we  read  in  Scriptures,  in  the  very  commandments  He 
gave  on  Sinai :  "/  am  a  jealous  God,  who  will  visit  the 
iniquities  of  the  fathers  upon  their  children,  to  the  third  and 
fourth  generation."  (Exod.  xx.  5.;  Deutr.  v.  9.)  Accord- 
ing to  enlightened  ideas,  this  impeaches  both  the  unity  of 
God  and  his  infinite  goodness. 

A  God  who  has  no  equal,  hence  no  rival,  of  whom  should 
He  be  jealous?  And  an  all-good  and  merciful  God,  would 
He  punish  the  innocent  for  the  guilty,  even  if  they  were 
father  and  son? 

To  investigate  this  we  must  be  cognizant  of  the  fact  that 
the  writers  of  the  Scriptures  made  some  mistakes  in  their 
manuscripts,  on  account  of  which  the  i-ip  (K'ri)  and  DTID 
(K'thib)  rule  was  adopted,  i.  e.,  words  that  are  written  one 
way  and  must  be  read  another  way.  So,  for  instance,  do 
we  often  find  written  «in  (hu)  he,  when  it  should  be  read 
STI  (hi),  she,  just  the  opposite  in  gender.  Likewise  does  it 
frequently  occur  that  ny^  (naar),  boy,  has  to  be  read  nnyj 
(naarah),  girl.  Under  this  rule  we  read  in  Genesis  xlix.  11, 
iroh  (his  foal),  while  it  is  written  irah  (her  foal),  and  in  the 
same  place  we  read  sussoh  (his  horse),  while  it  is  written 
sussah  (her  horse). 

In  Exodus  iii.  2  we  read  riT  HD,  mah  zeh  (what  is  this?), 
while  it  is  written  riTD,  m^zeh  (from  this),  and  so  could  we 
cite  hundreds  of  instances  from  Scriptures  Avhich  had  to  be 
corrected  by  later  translators  ;  as  it  was,  however,  not  per- 
missible to  change  the  original  writing,  the  letters  were  left 
unchanged,  but  the  reading  had  to  be  corrected.  Is  it  not, 
then,  possible  that  the  K  in  mp  ( Kanna)  should  have  been 


32 

a  n,  which  would  make  it  Hip  (Koneh),  like  in  Jeremiah 
1.  11,  where  a  n  stands  for  an  t<  in  nti'T  (dashah)?  May  this 
error  not  have  been  left  uncorrected  by  an  oversight? 

El  is  power,  and  not  God,  although  it  sometimes  stands 
for  God  as  a  power;  but  here,  where  adonoi  elohecho  (the 
Lord  thy  God)  precede  it  —  the  name  of  God  twice — it  is 
hardly  probable  that  el  would  stand  for  God ;  but  when  it 
stands  for  power  it  would  read  :  "  I,  the  Lord  thy  God,  am 
a  power,  a  possessor,  visiting  the  iniquities,"  etc.  "A  pos- 
sessor of  heaven  and  earth."     ( Vide  Gen.  xiv.  16.) 

The  word  poked,  from  the  verb  jmkad,  is  nowhere  employed 
in  Scriptures  to  denote  punishment;  later  translators  must 
have  been  led  astray  by  Jeremiah's  version,  where  he  says 
( Jerem.  xxxii.  18), "  the  Lord  will  give  kindness  to  thousands, 
and  (D^B^D,  meshalem)  recompense  (not  visit)  the  iniquities 
of  the  fathers  into  the  bosom  of  their  children;"  but  he  says 
nothing  about  the  third  and  fourth  generations,  which 
makes  the  prophet's  rendition  apparently  clear  and  natural, 
without  any  reference  to  the  subject  in  question.  The 
iniquities — the  errors — of  parents  are  transmitted  by  the 
laws  of  nature  into  the  bosom  of  their  children,  which  the 
prophet  calls  recompensation  of  the  errors  of  the  fathers. 

The  word  pakad  seems  to  be  a  password  —  a  word  of 
recognition  —  given  to  Israel  by  Joseph  in  Egypt  (see  Gen. 
1.  24,  25).  There  he  gives  the  word  with  the  emphasis 
characteristic  of  the  Hebrew  language  as  pakad  yifkad  (he 
will  surely  visit).  "When  Elohim  will  surely  visit  you," 
is  the  passage,  "  you  shall  take  my  bones  with  you."  Did 
Joseph  mean  to  say,  when  God  will  surely  punish  you? 
We  know  well  that  he  did  not  mean  that. 

When  the  Lord  sent  Moses  to  Pharoah  and  instructed 
him  what  to  say  to  Israel  He  gave  him  the  word  pakad  {vide 


33 

Exod.  iii.  16),  which  seems  to  have  been  recognized  by  that 
people  (ibid.  iv.  31). 

Moses  when  complying  with  the  request  of  Joseph  to  take 
his  bones  out  of  Egypt,  pakad  is  mentioned  as  the  reason  of 
his  compliance  (vide  Exod.  xiii.  19),  hence  when  Israel,  less 
than  three  months  later,  stood  at  the  foot  of  Mount  Sinai 
receiving  the  commandments,  they  could  hardly  have 
understood  pakad,  unlike  in  the  previous  instance,  to  mean 
punishment. 

Pakad  meant  to  Israel  what  it  expresses  in  the  Hebrew 
language  and  in  Scripture  literature,  visitation,  i.  e.,  redeem- 
ing visitation ;  and  when  the  infinitely  merciful  God  uttered 
it  in  His  decalogue  it  could  not  have  suddenly  changed  its 
meaning. 

We  would,  therefore,  read  the  passage  like  this  :  "  Thou 
shalt  not  serve  them  (the  idols),  for  I,  the  Lord  thy  God, 
am  a  power,  a  possessor,  who  will  visit  the  iniquities  of  the 
fathers  upon  their  children,  to  redeem  them  from  their 
errors." 

This  is  evidently  correct  when  we  consider  that  in  Hebrew 
the  word  for  punishment  is  annash  or  yassar,  and  since  none 
of  these  words  is  used  we  can  safely  say  that  it  was  not 
intended  for  such.  God  is  too  merciful  and  too  benign  to 
punish  one  for  the  sins  of  another,  and  Scriptures  have  no 
passage  to  assert  that  He  would,  but,  on  the  contrary,  Moses 
distinctly  says  (Deutr.  xxiv.  16) :  "The  fathers  shall  not 
be  put  to  death  for  their  children,  nor  the  children  for  their 
fathers,  but  each  shall  be  put  to  death  for  his  own  sin." 

Jeremiah  (xxi.  29)  and  Ezekiel  (xviii.  2)  repeat  this 
almost  verbatim,  and  other  Scripture  writers  also  promul- 
gate this  doctrine. 


34 


DOES  SCRIPTURE  FORETELL  ISRAEL'S  CONDI- 
TION AS  IT  IS  AND  EVER  WILL  BE? 

WE  notice  of  late  that  some  Christian  commentators 
of  the  Bible,  in  speaking  of  the  lamentable  condition 
of  the  Jews  in  Russia,  make  it  appear  that  the 
twenty-eighth  chapter  of  Deuteronomy  foretells  this  condi- 
tion of  Israel;  and  even  at  that  celebrated  conference  of 
Jews  and  Christians  held  in  Chicago  this  was  mentioned. 
It  is  thus  meet  that  we  should  probe  this  matter  and  see 
whether  those  interpreters  are  right  or  not. 

The  chapter  in  question  foretells,  in  case  of  disobedience 
of  the  commands  and  statutes  of  the  Lord,  and  not  because 
of  the  rejection  of  the  Messiah,  that  Israel  shall  be  terribly 
maltreated,  pillaged,  robbed,  etc.,  but  at  the  same  time  it 
also  foretells  that  they  shall  be  afflicted  with  such  diseases 
with  which  Israel  is  not,  and  in  history  past  was  never 
afflicted.  Quite  the  contrary,  Israel  is  a  healthy  race,  not 
even  subject  to  a  great  many  maladies  that  Christians  suffer 
from.  This  is  a  fact  acknowledged  by  life  insurance  com- 
panies and  medical  authorities.  If,  then,  one  part  of  the 
chapter  is  not  verified,  how  can  we  quote  at  this  remote  time 
the  other  part  as  a  prophecy  now  being  fulfilled — fulfilled  on 
a  people  that  violate  not,  but  most  rigidly  adhere  to,  the  laws 


35 

of  God  as  they  conceive  them?  And  that  they  are  honest  and 
sincere  in  their  conviction  is  evident  from  the  fact  that  they 
rather  endure  all  oppressions  and  persecutions  than  re- 
nounce their  faith ;  and  surely  they  are  not  suffering  for  the 
sins  of  others,  for  that  would  not  be  in  accordance  with  the 
mercy  of  God.  I  have  demonstrated  this  in  the  preceding 
chapter,  showing  that  God  would  not  punish  the  children 
for  the  sins  of  their  parents.  How  much  less  would  He 
let  an  innocent  people  suffer  for  the  wickedness  of  others? 
And  surely  all  Israel  are  not  wicked.  There  always  were 
and  there  are  now  some  wicked  ones  among  them,  of  course, 
but  there  are  also  good  and  God-fearing  men  even  among 
the  very  ones  that  suffer  agonies  and  torture  under  the 
tyrannical  persecution  of  Russia. 

If  these  Bible  interpreters  so  believe  in  prophecies  con- 
tained in  the  Old  Testament,  why  do  they  not  bear  in  mind, 
even  if  it  means  literally  the  same,  that  God  will  visit  the 
iniquities  of  the  parents  upon  their  children  till  the  third  and 
fourth  generation  only  (vide  Exod.  xx.  5 ;  Deutr.  v.  9),  while 
here  it  would  seem  that  it  extends  to  infinite  time? 

The  fact  is  that  Deutr.  xxviii.  was  spoken  by  Moses  to 
Israel  living  at  that  time  only,  and  to  those  that  had  to  pass 
over  Jordan,  without  any  reference  whatever  to  generations 
thereafter.  (See  Deutr.  xxvii.  2,  which  is  the  introductory 
to  the  succeeding  chapter.) 

That  this  position  is  correct  we  perceive  from  Deutr.  xi. 
2,  where  it  says :  "  For  I  speak  not  with  your  children 
which  have  not  known  and  have  not  seen  the  chastisement 
of  your  God,  His  greatness,  His  mighty  hand,  and  His  out- 
stretched arm,"  etc.  How  could  this,  then,  speak  to  us 
now  at  this  remote  time,  if  it  was  not  intended  for  any  who 
have  not  seen  the  wonders  and  miracles  of  God? 


36 

Moses,  we  learn  from  Scriptures,  tirelessly  exhorted  Israel 
to  teach  their  children  the  ways,  statutes  and  ordinances  of 
God,  but  nowhere  can  we  find  that  children  not  taught  so 
should  still  be  held  accountable  for  wrongs  they  committed 
in  ignorance,  not  thinking  it  wrong? 

Christians  believe  that  "  through  the  seed  of  Abraham, 
Isaac  and  Jacob  (vide  Gen.  xxii.  18 ;  xxvi.  5 ;  xxviii.  14)  the 
nations  and  families  of  the  earth  (Christians,  of  course, 
included)  shall  be  blessed."  Now,  in  order  to  fulfill  that 
which  they  believe  is  prophecy,  they  have  persecuted  the 
object  of  their  blessing  —  because  it  was  so  prophesied  — 
and  they  have  succeeded  in  fulfilling  parts  of  Deuteronomy 
xxviii.  They  have  scattered  them,  slaughtered  them,  made 
the  "  tail  and  not  the  head  "  of  them  ;  they  separated  parents 
from  their  children ;  they  have  done  all  they  could  to  fulfill 
as  much  as  lay  in  their  power  of  that  famous  chapter  — 
because  it  was  the  will  of  God  they  had  to  become  the  instru- 
ments ;  but  when  Jesus,  by  fulfillment  (?)  of  prophecy,  was 
crucified,  the  Jews,  who,  as  Christians  claim,  had  crucified 
him,  had  become  despised  and  scorned  for  becoming  God's 
instrument. 

Why  not  read  that  chapter  like  many  other  chapters  and 
passages  in  Scriptures  and  acknowledge  that  you  do  not 
understand  it  at  all,  and  take  the  words  of  Moses  (Deutr. 
xxix.  29) :  "  Hidden  things  belong  to  the  Lord  our  God, 
but  revealed  matters  to  us  and  to  our  children  forever?  " 

If,  then,  Israel's  dispersion  and  persecution  should  not 
seem  to  you  as  natural  consequences  of  the  ways  and  man- 
ners during  the  barbarous,  dark  and  Middle  Ages,  when 
might  was  right,  put  it  to  the  hidden  things  which  you  can 
not  fathom,  to  the  mysteries  you  can  not  solve,  and  leave  it 
to  Him  who  knows  all ;  but  to  ofier  me  your  explanation  to 


37 

my  query  why  your  father,  your  grandfather  and  your  great- 
grandfather had  abused  and  mistreated  my  ancestors  and 
my  people,  that  "■God  wanted  it  so,^'  is  far  from  expressing 
religiousness.  Did  not  God  also  want  —  quoting  Christian- 
ity — "  to  love  those  that  hate  you,  to  pray  for  them  that 
despitefully  use  you,"  etc.? 

What  we  then  want  our  Christian  friends  to  speculate  on 
now  is  not  why  we  have  suffered,  but  why  we  could  not  live 
together  amicably  —  now  that  the  refulgent  light  of  civiliza- 
tion beams  into  every  intelligent  soul ;  why  we  should  not 
bury  the  past,  and  clasp  each  other's  hands,  and  march 
together  onward  and  forward  as  brothers  of  the  same  human 
family  and  children  of  the  same  (Heavenly)  Father. 


DEVIL  AND  HELL. 

WE  hear  a  good  deal  of  talk  about  devil  and  hell,  and 
with  thundering  force  are  they  employed  in  the 
pulpits.  The  New  Testament  abounds  in  these 
expressions,  but  the  Old  Testament  in  the  original  Hebrew 
does  not  contain  them. 

Moses,  the  great  statesman,  leader  and  teacher,  seemed  to 
have  no  word  for  them;  David  and  Solomon,  the  great 
poets  in  Psalmody,  Proverbialism  and  Ecclesiastics,  do  not 
utter  them;  and  Isaiah,  the  King  of  Prophets,  with  all 
other  prophets  and  Scripture  writers  to  follow,  never  taught 
any  doctrines  concerning  devil  and  hell. 

The  word  devil,  according  to  Christian  Bible  translators, 
is  not  found  once  in  the  Old  Testament,  except  in  plural 
form,  and  then  only  four  times,  and  in  no  other  personi- 


38 

fication  than  admonishing  Israel  not  to  offer  sacrifices  to 
him. 

The  words  they  render  as  devil  must  have  been  conveyed 
to  the  translators  either  by  a  tradition  known  to  them  only, 
or  it  is  their  own  invention,  for  Q'^n'^J?^  (s'irim,  Lev.  xvii.  7 
and  II.  Chron.  xi.  15)  means  goats  or  hairy  ones,  probably 
referring  to  the  goat-god  which  the  Egyptians  worshiped,  or 
a  ">Safi/r,"  in  which  form  the  false  gods  of  the  heathens 
were  generally  represented,  but  in  nowise  can  it  be  rendered 
devil. 

Luther,  unlike  the  English  translators,  renders  it  "Feld- 
teufel  "  (a  faun),  which  is  undoubtedly  more  correct,  when 
we  take  its  translation  as  the  hairy  one. 

The  other  word  is  W^l^i;  (shaidim,  Deutr.  xxxii.  17  and 
Psl.  cvi.  37),  which  means  lords  or  idols,  the  latter  taking 
its  origin  probably  from  the  fact  that  lords  —  tyrants  and 
despots  —  often  forced  the  people  to  deify  them,  and  the 
Israelites  are  warned  not  to  offer  sacrifice  to  them,  for  the 
Lord  He  is  to  be  adored,  and  no  other.  The  word  |t2ty 
(satan)  would  be  about  the  nearest  to  the  translation  of 
devil,  but  even  that  means  tempter,  or  hinderer,  and  iHDX 
(ahadon)  is  destroyer,  but  a  direct  word  is  nowhere  found  in 
the  Old  Testament,  nor  in  the  Hebrew  language. 

There  is  likewise  no  word  in  the  Hebrew  for  hell,  and 
Christian  translators  have  taken  the  word  sheol  for  it,  but 
how  incorrect  they  are  is  evident  from  the  words  of  David 
(II.  Sam.  xxii.  6).  When  he  said,  "  The  sorrows  of  sheol 
compassed  me  about,"  did  he  mean  hell?  Was  he  in  hell 
alive? 

In  another  place  (Ps.  cxxxix.  8)  he  says:  "If  I  make 
my  bed  in  sheol  Thou  (God)  art  with  me."  Is  it  supposed 
that  God  was  in  hell  with  David? 


39 

Jonah  while  in  the  fish  prays  (Jonah  ii.  3) :  "  Out  of  the 
belly  of  sheol  I  have  cried  unto  thee !  "  Was  he  simulta- 
neously in  hell  and  in  the  fish?  Can  we  not  see  the  inap- 
plicability of  sheol  into  hell?  The  translators  themselves 
depart  sometimes  from  this  translation  and  make  it  (as  in 
Gen.  xxxvii.  35  and  other  places)  grave,  and  in  Job  (xvii. 
16)  it  is  translated  pit;  while  the  late  revisers  of  the  Bible 
knew  not  better  than  to  leave  it  sheol,  untranslated. 

Its  correct  translation  is  subterranean  cavity,  and  is  used 
in  Scriptures  metaphorically,  thus  when  David  cries  :  "  Thou 
wilt  not  let  my  soul  go  down  to  sheol"  (not  to  hell),  he 
prays  hopefully  to  God  that  He  would  not  permit  him  to 
fall  into  deep  despair ;  and  when  he  moans :  "  The  sorrow 
of  sheol  compassed  me  about,"  he  meant  to  say,  "  I  am 
almost  despondent !  " 

When  he  says :  "  If  I  make  my  bed  in  sheol  thou  art  with 
me,"  he  simply  expresses  his  trust  and  confidence  in  God 
whom  he  feels  that  He  is  with  him  in  his  deep  despair  and 
grave  despondency. 

The  Jews  also  were  not  free  from  this  superstition,  but 
they  have  learned  it  from  the  Heathens,  among  whom  they 
were  forced  to  sojourn  as  captives ;  and  Babylon,  the  cradle 
of  superstition,  no  doul)t,  contributed  largely  to  this ;  yet 
it  was  never  so  universal  with  them  as  it  was  and  still  is 
with  some  other  religionists.  The  Jews,  furthermore,  are 
ridding  themselves  fast  of  this  superstition,  cognizant  of 
the  sublimity  of  Judaism,  which  tolerates  no  such  impure 
and  obscure  doctrines. 

To  treat  this  etymologically  it  would  seem  that  hell  was 
made  the  antithesis  to  heaven :  one  to  be  the  abode  of  the 
wicked,  the  other  of  the  just.  The  abode  of  the  just  was 
then"  called   Gan-Ed€n,\  garden  of  Eden,  or  delights  (sur- 


40 

named  Paradise),  and  the  abode  of  the  godless  Gai- 
Hinnom.  valley  of  Hinnom ;  one  of  transcendant  glory  and 
the  other  of  profound  ignominy.  The  one  of  glory  was  the 
place  imagined  as  pleasant  and  delightful,  as  the  place 
where  the  first  man  and  the  first  woman  dwelt  while  they 
were  yet  pure  and  innocent;  and  the  place  of  ignominy 
(surnamed  Hell)  as  gloomy  and  miserable  as  the  valle}'^  of 
Hinnom  (see  II.  Kings  ii.  30;  Jerem.  xix.  2;  ib.  xxxii.  35 
and  II.  Chron.  xxiii.  6),  where  children  were  burned  alive 
as  sacrifices  to  Moloch.  Thus  the  garden  of  Eden  became 
the  place  of  eternal  beatitude,  while  the  fires  of  the  valley 
of  Hinnom — the  fires  that  consumed  innocent  children — 
became  the  everlasting  fire  of  brimstony  Gehena. 

Religion  without  devil,  hell  and  'paradise  is  pure  and 
sublime — it  is  the  religion  of  love  and  godliness — a  religion 
issuing  from  the  heart  of  hearts  and  not  enforced  by  ordi- 
nances and  edicts  of  priests  and  rabbins. 

A  religion  that  prompts  us  to  abstain  from  evil  and 
wrong  because  we  fear  that  we  will  suffer  the  consequences 
is  false  religion,  and  such  abstinence  from  evil  is  but  animal 
compliance ;  nor  is  the  good  done  with  an  expectancy  of 
reaping  reward  truly  religious. 

To  give  a  hungry  person  bread  Avorth  a  penny  because 
God  will  reward  it  with  a  dime's  worth  of  paradise  (or 
heaven),  is  to  enter  into  a  bargain  with  God  speculating  on 
good  profit ;  and  then  again  to  abstain  from  stealing  because 
we  fear  that  we  will  be  sent  to  hell  for  it  is  trying  to  deceive 
God,  showing  Him  that  we  did  not  steal,  although  the  heart 
would  have  desired  to  do  so. 

True  and  enlightened  religion  is  that  which  prompts  us 
to  be  and  to  do  good  for  the  love  of  God  and  the  good  itself, 
and  not  for  the  reward  that  it  will  bring — not  for  specula- 


41 

tive  motives ;  and  to  eschew  evil  should  likewise  be  for  the 
love  of  God  and  the  abhorrence  of  the  evil. 

When  we  will  have  reached  the  summit  of  enlightenment, 
and  the  scintilhiting  spark  of  true  religion — regardless  at 
what  shrine  it  is  confessed — will  have  ignited  our  soul,  we 
will  need  no  Eden  to  be  held  forth  as  a  bribe  or  inducement 
to  do  good,  nor  will  we  need  the  devil  and  hell  to  trepidate 
and  keep  us  from  doing  evil ;  but  we  will  do  that  which  is 
right  because  the  love  of  God  and  our  fellow-man  will  be 
impressed  in  our  heart. 


WHICH  IS  THE  TRUE  RELIGION? 

SOME  have  an  idea  that  there  can  be  but  one  true  re- 
ligion and  that  all  others  are  false ;  but  this  idea  is 
just  as  absurd  as  to  think  that  there  is  but  one 
true  method  of  teaching  arithmetic  or  grammar,  or  that 
there  is  but  one  way  to  reach  London,  or  that  there  is  but 
one  way  to  train  a  child.  Some  parents  train  their  children 
differently  from  others,  and  yet  the  same  results  are  reached. 
Some  captains  may  steer  their  ship  on  a  different  course  to 
reach  the  same  destination  as  others,  but  they  reach  it ;  and 
some  teachers  vary  in  methods  from  others,  yet  their  pupils 
become  equally  accomplished.  Likewise  in  religion,  which 
has  been  given  to  mankind  for  the  government  of  their 
morals  and  virtues.  Each  creed  and  each  denomination 
has  the  same  object  in  view.  Each  wants  to  perfect  its 
members  in  their  qualities  as  good  men  and  women  ;  and, 
aside  of  the  dogmas  that  churches  contain,  they  succeed 


42 

very  well,  for  there  are  good  men  and  good  women  in  every 
church  and  every  religion,  and  that  man  shall  be  honest, 
upright  and  God-fearing  we  all  agree  on.  What  we  do  not 
agree  on  is  matter  that  pertains  to  the  hereafter — a  matter 
of  which  none  has  the  remotest  knowledge.  One  believes 
— and  only  by  faith — that  he  will  reach  it  by  the  grace  of 
his  Savior,  while  the  other  believes  that  God,  the  Father, 
will  admit  all  His  children  worthy  of  admittance.  And 
how  is  the  faith  transmitted  into  the  bosom?  Surely,  the 
Lord  would  not  be  so  unjust  as  to  imbue  one  soul  with  the 
true  religion  and  the  other  with  the  false  religion,  and  then 
hold  the  false  religionist  accountable  for  his  faithlessness. 
Nay,  the  Lord  would  not  open  the  eyes  of  one  and  strike 
the  other  with  opacity.     Religion  is  a  matter  of  education. 

The  stone-cutter  takes  the  rough  ashler  and  squares  it 
and  smoothes  it ;  then  polishes  it  and  engraves  letters  and 
signs  upon  it ;  thus  it  rests  as  the  cornerstone  of  a  building. 
That  stone  will  ever  bear  those  letters  and  signs.  Its  letters 
may  be  filled  up  with  putty  or  any  other  substance,  but 
they  will  be  visible.  It  may  be  painted  over,  then  some  one 
will  take  turpentine  and  wash  it  off,  and  there  the  letters 
will  appear ;  and  except  the  stone  be  utterly  defaced,  the 
letters  and  sign  engraven  on  it  originally  will  forever  re- 
main there. 

Such  is  the  little  heart  of  the  babe.  Like  the  rough  stone 
just  from  the  quarries  the  mother  takes  it  in  hand,  and 
with  her  fondling  and  caressing  smoothes  it,  then  takes  the 
chisel  of  love  and  the  mallet  of  affection  and  engraves  into 
it  the  insignia  of  her  religion.  The  lullaby  at  its  cradle  is 
sung  with  words  of  the  Savior ;  the  first  prayer  it  is  taught 
to  lisp  is  to  the  Savior ;  the  little  stories  told  to  it  are  of  the 
Savior.     The  Sunday-school  it  is  sent  to  is  the  school  where 


43 

the  doctrines  of  a  Savior  are  taught.    The  associates  and 
all  the  surroundings  are  believers  of  a  Savior,  and  if  that 
child  grows  up  a  religionist  it  can  not  be  but  a  believer  in  the 
Savior;  Avhile  with  a  Jewish  child  it  is  just  the  opposite. 
Its  mother  will  whisper  into  its  little  ears  the  trust  and  con- 
fidence in  a  one  and  indivisible  God.     It  will  be  taught  to 
pray  to  God  and  Him  alone,  and  it  will  be  reared,  trained 
and  educated  to  be  a  Jew ;  and  with  exceptions  very  rare 
the  Christian  lives  and  dies  as  a  Christian,  and  the  Jew 
lives  and  dies  as  a  Jew.     And  if  the  Lord  would  have  pre- 
ferred that  the  human  race  should  possess  one  religion,  He 
would  not  have  permitted  His  prophet  to  say  that  "  All  the 
people  shall  walk,  each  in  the  name  of  his  god  (his  religion), 
and  we  will  walk  in  the  name  of  the  Lord  our  God"  (Micah 
iv.  5) ;  or,  "  From  the  rising  of  the  sun  until  his  going  down 
my  name  shall  be  great  among  the  Gentiles  "  (Mai.  i.  11). 
This  clearly  indicates  that  the  cardinal  doctrine  of  re- 
ligion is  the  belief  of  God.     All  else  are  ceremonies  and 
customs,  adopted  at  various  ages  and  suitable  to  the  drift 
of  those  ages. 

To  be  good,  honest,  upright,  moral  and  virtuous  is  suit- 
able and  requisite  at  all  ages,  and  among  all  nations  and 
peoples.  The  religion,  then,  that  can  accomplish  this  is  a 
true  religion. 


The  American  Hebrew  Feblisrini;  and  PriiYum;  House. 

KSTABLISHKD    IH-M.  CINCINNATI,   O. 

We   Offer  the  following  Books:  SK.\T  rosTi-AlD  <i.\  REcEll'T  iiF  I'JilCE. 

THF    nOSMIG    GOD        Hv   tho  Rev.  Dr.   I.   M.   Wise.      A   PhiIosoi>hical   Conciliation  of 
ifolilAmi   ami   Science.     A  book   for  thinkers   and   students.    Cloth     -        -        $100 

THE  MARTYRDOM  OF  JESUS  OF  NAZARETH.  A  Historic  Critical  Treatise 
on  the  last  clTaiTtei-i  of  the  Gosj.el.  Kv  the  Kev.  Dr.  Isaac  M.  Wise.  This  book  tells 
us  all  about  Cliristianitv  in  a  spirit  of  veracity  and  honest  argument  in  a  concise 
and  clear  stvle.  It  shows  that  Jesus  did  not  establish  any  Sacrament;  that  he  died 
to  «ave  the 'lives  of  his  discii>les;  that  he  was  not.  tried  before  any  .Jewish  author- 
itv:  that  it  is  not  certain  that  he  was  crucified;  that  if  he  was  crucihed,  the 
Kbmans  and  not  the  Jews  did  it.  The  book  throws  liulit  on  nuiuerous  i.assages 
in  the  new  Testament,  the  Talinudic  Laws  and  Maxims,  all  rendered  from  the 
Originals   by  the  Author.    Price *l  "" 

DEFENSE  NOT  DEFIANCE  By  the  Rev.  Dr.  F.  De  Sola  Mendes.  A  Hebrew's  Rei'ly 
to  the  >Iissi,marie/^  I'Vrt  1.  Faith  Confirmed:  Part  2.  Biblical  and  Rabbinical 
rarallels   to   tlie   New   Testament    Principles    --------        75  cts. 

THE   GROUNDS   OF  CHRISTIANITY.    Examined  by  conqiaring  the  New  Testament 
^^    wUh  Uie  Old  ivrtam"t."  To  the  intelligent  and  candid  who  are   willing,  to  listen 
to    everv    opinion   that   is    supiiorted    bv    reason,  and  not    averse   to  bringing    then- 
own  opinion   to  the   test  of    examination."    By   George    Bethune   Knglish.  A.   -^I-/" 
which  is  added  a  "  Review  of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount."    By  the  Rev.  Dr.  Zipser.  .*!  u(i 

THE  CRUCIFIXION  Viewed  from  a  .Jewish  standpoint.  A  lecture  delivered  before 
the  Cliicauo  Institute  for  Morals,  Religion  and  Letters.    By  Dr.  E.  v4.  Hirsch    -  So  cts. 

LETTERS  ON  THE  EVIDENCE  OF  CHRISTIANITY.  By  I'^IVJ^'":'"  il!"rb.d'"if 
nandez.  "He  that  holds  an  lionestlv  ac(|uire<l  opinion  will  not  be  ottendeii  a 
opinions  are  expressed  that  mav  differ  from  his  own.  Tlie  time  is  past  when  t  le 
overawed  Jew  conld  but  sufTer  and  die  for  his  convictions;  on  the  contrary,  ho 
is  expected  to  state  the  reasons  why  during  nearly  twenty  ceuttiries  he  Has  held 
fast   to   his   own   opinion   in  spite   of  all  outside  pressure."        -        -        -        -    -hO  cts. 

THE  ORIGIN  OF  CHRISTIANITY.,  in  three  lecttires  By  Dr.  I.  M -^Vise.  l-  J'^«"; 
tlic    I'liaiisee.    J.  The   Apostles  and   the   Essencs.    3.   Paul   and   the   Mystics    -    M  cts. 

JEW  AND  GENTILE  Their  Mutual  Relations  and  Welfare.  A  report  of  a  Confer- 
ence of  IsK.\Ei,iTES  and  Christians  held  at  Chicago.  Said  Conference  was  called 
from  a  desire  -'to  give  and  receive  information,"  to  promote  a  spirit  of  iminiry 
on  the  basis  of  mutual  kindness  between  Jew  and  Christian.  Both  sides  ol  tie 
(luestion  are  comi>rehensivelv  debated,  and  in  a  fair  and  kindly  si>irit,  by  the 
Rev  Dr.  Emit  (i.  Hirsch.  the  Rev.  Dr.  B.  Felsenthal  and  the  Rev.  Dr.  Joseph 
Stolz  representing  the  Jewish  side,  and  the  following  eminent  Divines  represent- 
ing the  Christian;  the  Rev.  Dr.  E.  P.  Goodwin,  the  Rev.  Dr.  J.  H.  Barrows,  the 
Rev.    Dr.  J.   M.    Caldwell,  Prof.    David   C.    Martinis    and    Prof.   H.   M.    Scott.        OL'iit 

1  ostpaid   to  anv  address;     Paper  Cover -        -        -        '^^  ^ts. 

Clotli    bound ----- /&   cts. 

THE  REAL  JESUS  A  review  of  liis  Life.  Character  and  Death,  from  a  Jewish 
-tandi.oint.  Addressed  to  Merib-r;  of  the  Theistic  Church.  By  John  ^  inkers. 
London -        -  ...-----        r^  m 

A  GUIDE  FOR  RATIONAL  INQUIRIES  INTO.  c3.BL!CAL  Wf''TI'Nf?S- ,J>;.,!|:^^^^ 
Rev.  Isidor  Kalisch.  Being  !iTi  examination  ol  the  doctrinal  dilTeieuce^  between 
Judaism  and  Primitive  Christianity,  based  upon  a  critical  exposition  of  the  Booc 
of    Matthew -        -        :fl  (U 

THE  SEMITIC  NATIONS.  By  Dr.  D.  Chowlsou.  Or.b  Pmf.  at  the  Imp.  rniversity 
I.I    >t     Prter-ibur-.    Translated    by   Eph.   M.    Epstein,   M.   D        -        -        -        -         ''0  cts. 

THE  WANDERING  JEW.  By  the  .Rov.  Dr.  I.<«ac  M.  Wise.  T^  '7  ,■n^lw.^\^orM''s 
.•ontrasted  with  the  Jew  of  Fiction.  The  part  Israel  has  i>l.ived  m  tlie  "oilds 
Civilization.     Paper '-'  *-'ts. 

JEWISH    LAW  OF    MARRIAGE    AND    DIVORCE,     in  ancient   and   modern   times 

and   its     relation    to    the    L.-iw    oi    tin-     Stat.'      Hv    Dr.    M.    Nael/.nier.    Profcssoi    at    the 
Hebrew    Cnion   Cd'-.—j         -  *'- "" 

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